A Man on a Mission
by MercyFrost
Summary: Mike Sullivan was adopted into a weird situation, and he's dealt with all of that. But his adoptive mother's curiosity and knack for landing in the middle of danger has rubbed off on him. Soon he finds secrets that have killed and possibly will again.
1. Chapter 1

Hi, my name is Michael Sullivan. My friends call me Mike. Today I'm starting a mission of sorts. Well, I guess I should start with the basics. The basics being, I'm adopted, and my adoptive mother is Superman's best friend. She works at this place called Watchtower where she helps superheroes save the world. Ever since I came around, three years ago, when I was twelve, I've seen this picture of some red-headed lady on the wall and I have no idea who she is. I get the same answer every time I ask about her. Uncle Clark always says, "She's a courageous hero," him always thinking the best of everyone. Aunt Lois always laughs and says, "A pit-bull in Prada," which I never really understood, but that's what she says. And my Mom says, "An unexpected friend," why she was so unexpected I don't know either. Uncle Oliver just shakes his head and whispers "Mercy." So obviously he knew her pretty well and isn't willing to talk about it.

My mom is what most people call computer savvy. She taught me a lot so I figure I'll start tracking her down by running a simple facial recognition scan. My mom must have known I was going to pursue this because she blocked the scan before I even searched it. "Come on," I mutter under my breath, glaring at the screen.

Who else would have known this strange woman? Maybe Lana Lang, Mom's childhood friend who just came back into the picture, though not as much as before. She just took care of her kryptonite issue. She's part of the Justice League, but not really a part of our close circle. Her apartment is about two blocks from here, so I can walk. I grab my jacket and head out the door. I take two stairs at a time, trying to move as quickly as possible.

When I finally arrive at her door, I prepare myself on what I'm going to say. I knock three times. She opens the door and a puzzled look appears on her face for a brief moment, but then she recovers herself and puts on the warm look that always graces her features. "Hey, Mike, what's up?" I take a deep breath before I continue.

"I need to ask you something. Are you busy?" Lana shakes her head. She gestures for me to come in.

"Would you like something to drink? Water, iced tea, a coke?"

"Water, please." She nods her head and goes to retrieve a glass of water. I sit down in a chair. The apartment is a one-bedroom, with a small living room and a kitchen. It's decorated with a warm country feel with a touch of modern. It's a personal style unique to Lana. She returns with the glass of water I asked for. "Thank you," I say as she hands it to me. She seats herself on couch directly across from me.

"So, what's bugging you?" I take a sip of water then set it down on the coffee table in between us. I take yet another deep breath, unsure how to go about this.

"You know that picture that's hanging up in Watchtower? The one with the red-head?" she glances cautiously at me before nodding her head. "Who is she?"

"How much has your mom told you?"

"I've heard courageous hero, unexpected friend, and pit-bull in Prada." She chuckles at the last one.

"Pit-bull in Prada was Lois, right?" I nod.

"Mike, if your mom hasn't told you anything, neither can I. I'm sorry."

"Why won't she tell me anything?"

"Her story's complicated. She's… different than your average hero."

"She didn't have any powers?"

"No, she didn't. But that's not what made her different," she pauses and shakes her head slightly, "she was different."

"Who else knew her?"

"Everyone. Mike, leave it alone. Go home, be a normal teenager."

I lie. I nod my head and say "Okay." But since everyone knew her, there has to be someone that could explain. I'm going to be so dead for it, but no one else will answer so I have to go to Lex Luthor. A friend of mine works for him, he's an intern but still, he's been interning for 6 months and he's still alive. And he doesn't have anything really horrible against Mom, so I'll probably make it out alive. Besides, I know there's absolutely no logic to it, but I have a gut feeling he would know more than most.

I get up and walk towards the door. "Thanks though." I wave back at Lana and head down the hall, down the stairs, and over to the Luthorcorp. building. I debate on what I plan on saying. I mean, I can't flat out tell him that my mom is Superman's sidekick. I have a feeling that wouldn't take too well. I'll tell him that the picture is in our house and that I keep asking and no one will tell me much about her so I'm interviewing everyone that knew her. It's not too far from the truth, right?

I walk through the big, glass double doors and I into the bustling lobby of Luthorcorp. A woman comes up to me and asks what my business is, because let's face it, how many fifteen year olds come into the lobby of the largest corporation in world? Not many, right? I tell her I'd like to see my interning friend and she gives me directions on where to find him, which I follow until I'm out of her sight. Then, I change directions toward Lex's office. I knock on the door and a half-minded, "Come in," encourages me in.

"Hi, I'm Mike Sullivan." Lex looks up from the papers that are scattered across his desk.

"Chloe's kid, right?"

I nod, still a little unsure of myself. He puts his pen down and looks up at me with searching eyes.

"How can I help you?"

"Well I wanted to ask you a question."

"What question would you want to ask me?" he asked, placing special emphasis on the word me.

Stick to the plan. "This is going to sound kind of… um… random. But the red-head, who is she?" Well that came out a lot less confident than it was supposed to.

"Your mom wouldn't explain?"

"I got the feeling I wasn't supposed to ask. And I knew that if I asked and didn't get an answer that I wouldn't be able to ask anyone else." Good thing I wasn't confident or that would not have worked.

"And you didn't think I'd try to hurt you."

"I didn't think you had a reason to." I begin to squirm, letting my uncomfortable feeling to shine through so I sold the awkward teenager persona. He bought it, I think, anyway.

"Should I be worried that you do?" I ask after a moment of silence. He silently chuckles to himself and shakes his head.

"No."

After another period of silence I ask again, "Who's the red-head?"

"How detailed do you want me to be?"

"Well, a name would be a good start."

"Fair enough. Her name was Tess Mercer."

It's a completely legitimate statement, right? But one thing about it caught my attention. Was, he said was. "What happened to her?"

"What do you mean?" he returns. I'm not even sure he meant to say was. Maybe it was a slip of the tongue. But maybe not, and I've spent enough time with my Mom to know to explore every option.

"You said was. That means past tense. What happened to her?" I clarified.

"She died," he said just a little too simply, curtly. He didn't give any details, it was almost as though he didn't want me to know any more. But me being my mother's son, regardless of the fact that I'm adopted, she has still rubbed off on me, I pressed for details.

"How?" I push.

"Suicide," he said, still vague. Finally I begin to realize that I'm not going to get much more out of him. And with my handy-dandy laptop and her newfound name I'll be able to track her down in a way that would make my mother proud, if I could tell her, that is.

"Thank you," I say, turning to leave.


	2. Chapter 2

So while Lex was a little less cooperative than I had hoped, he still gave me a name to check up on. I'll head home and search her name through police records first then see where I should go from there. I walk into our apartment and Mom's sitting on the couch. "Hey, where you been?" she asks as I lean down to kiss her on the cheek.

"With Cory," I lie. I'll have to call him and tell him to lie just in case. Cory's my best friend and we've been hanging out most of summer break, just not today.

"Okay, you hungry?"

"Nah, not really. I'm heading into my room, okay?" I tell her.

She nods, and reverts her eyes back to the screen. She's either working Watchtower from home or working on an article for the Star City Register, where she works. She's probably working on an article, because she almost never takes anything important from Watchtower home with her. She says she doesn't like to because a few years ago her laptop was stolen with important data on it and Uncle Clark had to go through a lot to get it back. And if she's working on an article she probably won't be paying much attention to me until she finishes, which could be forever depending on how busy of a news day it is.

I walk into my room and plop down on my bed. I lean over and retrieve my laptop from the floor next to me. Mom doesn't usually go onto my laptop unless she forgets hers at Watchtower. And she doesn't check it periodically like most parents do, she trusts me. Unless of course, she hacks it and checks it, which, even with my skills at a computer, I still wouldn't be able to tell, because she's just too good for computer geniuses to see, never mind me.

Regardless of the fact that Mom may be watching, I begin to hack the police website. It takes me longer than it would've taken Mom, but I get the job done, and soon enough I'm in. I search the name Tess Mercer through the database. First I search for anything she might have done, just to see if maybe that's what Lana meant by different. Nothing, not even a DUI, never stole a pack of gum, nothing. It's cleaner than Uncle Clark's and you can bet his is sparkling clean.

Which is weird because you would expect that from Uncle Clark, I mean one look at him and you know he could never be involved in anything even slightly morally wrong, but this woman, this Tess Mercer, is different. In the picture you can tell she's smart, extremely smart, kind of like Mom. Actually the look in her eyes is like Mom and Aunt Lois' combined Mom's smarts and Aunt Lois' devious wit. But Tess Mercer's is a bit more powerful, almost, like it demands respect. But like Lana said she didn't have powers. Anyway, her near-glare glows with a different kind of power, one that dares you to defy her. It looks nearly amused, as though she knows something you don't and you're going to regret not knowing it, and she'll find it amusing.

And people with that kind of glare don't have clean records. Which mean it's a façade, someone wiped her record, or she was smart enough to never get caught. It seems as though it's the last one.

Anyway, Lex said she died, so there's probably a record on that somewhere, especially since it was supposedly suicide. So, I just search her name through the entire database. Tess Mercer: Suicide is what came up. I clicked on the case file. Apparently this investigation went on for six months, simply because everyone that knew her said she wasn't suicidal, that there was no way. Aunt Lois and Uncle Clark are on here, saying that there was absolutely no way she would. But regardless of that fact they closed the case.

Now, one thing about this case really stuck in my head, and it wasn't even Aunt Lois and Uncle Clark's testimonials. And it could be that I've been watching too many movies, but they never found the body, and that screams suspicious, to me at least.

"Hey, Mike," Mom calls. She comes over and leans in the doorway. I look up at her.

"Yeah?"

"I'm heading over to Watchtower. I've got to take Emil's shift tonight. There's pizza money on the counter. I'll be back around ten." That's when I realized it was already seven o'clock.

"Uh, yeah, okay, thanks. See you." She waves and walks out, and when I hear the door close I resume my poking around. While I'm poking around I see a file relating to Cadmus labs. Now what would Cadmus labs have anything to do with Tess Mercer? I go to click on it, but it doesn't work. I click on it again, nothing. Suddenly a message pops up. "Curiosity killed the cat. Imagine what it would do on a greater scale." As soon as I finish reading the message the computer shuts down. I didn't shut it down. Whoever is playing with me knows what they're doing. And they don't want me looking into this.


	3. Chapter 3

Okay, I've spent three years watching my Mom deal with the weird. And I've grown accustomed to most of it. But for someone to be able to bypass the firewalls Mom put in place is not something I saw coming. And, frankly, it scares me. I always knew my Mom is the best of the best, and no one could beat her, no one. But apparently I was wrong. There are only a few people that could even rival her. And one name popped right to the front of my mind. The one person who knew I was deeply looking into this. The one person who supplied all the answers I needed, and had enough resources to be able to crack my firewall wide open. Lex Luthor.

I'll need something with heavier artillery and much better fire walls to continue my search. I'll need Watchtower. I'll have to sneak out after Mom comes home and goes to bed. I then look over at the clock and realize I've been staring at a blank screen for a half an hour.

I decide to order my pizza; after all you can't sneak out and research some long dead red-head and an evil organization that does who knows what on an empty stomach. I order the pizza, eat it and watch tv until Mom gets home.

"Hey, you didn't have to wait up for me."

"I know."

She gives me a smile and says, "Okay well, I'm exhausted. So I'm going to bed. I'll see you in the morning. K?"

"Yup," I nod and waved. She heads back to her bedroom and I watch as she turns out the lights and gets into bed. I realize I won't be able to use the front door since Mom's room is right across from it. So I, like the average teenager, will have to sneak out through the window. I'll use the fire escape, it's kind of rickety, but when Mom goes out, she's out cold.

I run over to Watchtower which is only a block away from our house because Mom needs to be on call at all times. I'll need to make this quick, if Mom does wake up, I'm deader than Tess Mercer. So, this time having a much easier time hacking the police database using Watchtower than an out of date no name laptop. I'm about to click on the same link that I was going to at home when yet another message pops up. I read a message with words that send a chill down the spine of every teenager in the history of man. "I'm calling your mother."

Then, horror of horrors, the phone actually rings. I walk slowly, hesitantly towards the phone, unsure of whether or not I should actually pick it up. I decide to, even though I know who's on the other end. I know I'm going to hear the voice of Lex Luthor. And now I truly understand why everyone is so afraid of him. He was able to track down Watchtower and I led him here. I pick up the phone.

"Drop it, kid. I really don't have time for this," says a voice that's gone through many layers of voice scrambling. It's threatening, but it sounds almost distracted. But, anyway I counter its remark.

"I know it's you Mr. Luthor."

It sighs, it actually sighs! If I didn't know any better, then I would've thought it was disappointed in me. "You're not as smart as I thought you were, kid. We'll pick this up later." Well, it was. Then the line goes dead. Of course at that moment Dinah Lance (Black Canary) walks in.

"Who was that?"

"Wrong number."

"At Watchtower?"

"Yeah, somebody better tell the sales people not to call here."

She gives me a weird look and then leaves.

I have to track down this phone. If I can do that, I can identify who knew enough to call Watchtower. I run over to one of the monitors, and trace the number, but it was a disposable phone. Then I trace which cell tower the phone used.

Once I find out where it came from I access the video feed of the area. Then I see a woman on the phone on an empty street and a man coming up behind her, pulling a gun out of his jacket. She turns down an alleyway and the man follows and I know I have to save her, even if she isn't who I'm looking for.


	4. Chapter 4

I race through the streets unaware of where I'm going but trusting my subconscious to guide me there. I mean I know where she is, but I don't consciously know where to go. Finally, I end up on the right street and turn down the alleyway. My heart starts pounding even more so than it was before because the alleyway is completely empty.

I notice a dumpster and go over to it already despairing what I'm going to see because I know I'm going to see. The woman is dead, and it's my fault. I didn't make it. I open the dumpster and practically pull away before I even look inside. But what I see is exactly what I expected and not what I expected at all. The man with the gun is lying dead on a pile of garbage.

So I was right on the dead body front, but not on the who-it- was front. I go to turn him over to see the cause of death when a smooth, silky, and condescending voice stops me. "Do you really want your fingerprints all over a dead body?"

I freeze and slowly turn around, afraid of what I'll see. I know I'll look into the eyes of a killer. And I'm her new prey, because I saw the corpse she came back to collect. I turn around and see the familiar smart, snarky, and powerful green glare of none other than the supposedly dead Tess Mercer.

I let out a nervous chuckle, trying to seem more relaxed than I actually am. "Good point." The fake comfort doesn't seem to work on her. I can tell she can read me like a book.

"How?"

"How is a very vague question that's very much overused. Are you referring to the corpse in the dumpster or my mere presence?" I had completely forgotten about the dead dude. How horrible is that? I found a dead body in a dumpster less than a minute ago and I'd already forgotten about it.

"Both."

"Fair answer."

"But an answer that you seem to be avoiding."

"Believe me, kid, I'm anything but evasive." Kid? The only other person that called me kid was the person on the phone.

"You were the one that called on the phone."

She smiles like I'm some pet that finally learned a new trick. "I thought that was obvious. I was also the one who sent the messages and blocked the facial recognition scan." I thought the facial recognition scan was Mom. Well, then again, at that point I still thought she was dead.

"You didn't want to be found."

"You've been hanging around Clark too much."

"What?" What does Uncle Clark have anything to do with this?

"He has an uncanny knack for stating the obvious."

She still hasn't answered my question. She didn't want to be found, then why is she here? Why is she talking to me? Wouldn't it be easier to just leave me be? Every time I look into her emerald eyes I feel compelled to look away. Her gaze could rival Medusa's. She's looking at me as though I'm a pawn waiting to be sacrificed. I nod to acknowledge her previous statement, because she doesn't look like the kind of person that likes to be ignored. "Since you thought you made it obvious that you didn't want to be found, than why are you here, talking to me?"

She moved over to the dumpster that I had moved away from. She bends down to get a better look at the body as though she had some sick and twisted interest in it. "I didn't want you to take the fall for what I did."

"You think you'll get caught?"

"Of course not." She looks back at me and smirks at me. Do you remember my theories about her gaze and spotless record? I'm now leaning toward the she-just-never-got-caught theory. "The authorities will see the same footage I saw."

"You're also a lot more naive than I expected, kid."

"I don't understand."

"No surprise there, it's probably better that way. Anyway I have to go," she says as she looks back onto the street.

"Where?"

"It doesn't matter to you."

"Yes, it does," I assert. I expect her to look back at me furiously, outraged that I would even dare talk back to her. But instead, she looks back at me with the same cold, disinterested stare and that unsettles me even more.

"No, it doesn't, I'm leaving. Go home, kid," she explains. I almost listen, but then remember how against giving up Mom is. She turns and walks out of the alley. She has a brisk walk with not pep in her step, but definitely a bounce, but it's quick. I follow her halfway across town and she doesn't notice me. We go into a warehouse loaded with boxes like something you would find in a movie. I crouch down and lean against one of the boxes. She's obviously here to meet someone. Who, I don't know. I don't really need to see as long as I can hear. I wait in silence for a few seconds. And after about a minute a knife whizzes past my face. I freeze. And Tess' voice pierces the air.

"Did you really think I didn't know you were following me, kid?" I still don't move, hoping she'll take the silence as a sign that there's no one there. She doesn't. She walks over and stands over me, as she's standing over me I realize how tall she is, especially compared to Mom. Still facing me she plucks the knife from the crate next to me.

"I guess I'll have to take you to my boss." I can't imagine she would work for someone and not stab them in the back unless this person is even more powerful than she is. No matter what this can't end well.

"Get up, you frozen, kid? Let's move." I get up, still not willing to defy her.

"Who?" I ask. She doesn't answer but she does smirk.

"Not the kind of person I would have recommended you to see right now." I gulp and she leads me down the street and into an old apartment. "Are you ready?"

"As ready as I'm going to be."

She pushes the door open and greets her boss with, "I think this belongs to you." There is a chair behind a desk that's turned away. The chair turns and what I see scares me more than anything else could have.

"Mom?"


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

"Mom?"

She fixes me with a glare that would rival Uncle Clark's heat vision. But all she says is, "You are so grounded."

I spin around towards Tess with a shocked expression still blatant on my face. "My mom is your boss?" I yell.

She shrugs. "More like my partner." I take a deep breath.

"How long?" I ask.

Mom and Tess look towards each other and start to debate. "I was in his head for six months," Tess starts.

"In whose head?" I whip back. I think it's a pretty obvious and justified question but they don't seem to think so because they ignore me. I mean what does that even mean 'in his head'? Whose head?

"You came to me about a month after…"

"So, that means we've been doing this for about…"

"A little less than two and a half years," Mom concludes. The chemistry between these two was odd. I never would have expected Mom to be like this with someone like Tess. They're like, dare I say it, friends.

I wake myself up. "Doing what exactly?"

"Sorry, Mike, we can't tell you."

Then Tess surprises me. She actually agrees with me. "You know, Chloe, they're not going to hold back because he's a kid. In all honesty, they're probably going to be looking for him. At least if he has some information he could fight back, even if only a little."

Mom rolls her eyes. She sighs and shakes her head and then looks back at me. "I hate that you're always right."

"I wouldn't open my mouth if I wasn't completely sure I was right. You might want to let Lois in on that ethic." I snort in laughter and when I receive a death glare from Mom look down at my feet. But, I do hate that they have these little side conversations.

"So anyway, where do we start?" Mom asks looking at Tess.

"The beginning would be a good place," I interject.

Tess turns to me. "She was talking to me," she says looking at me with that same penetrating do-you-really-want-to-do-that glare. It instantly stops me from proceeding.

"And figuring out where exactly the beginning is, is the more difficult part," Mom intervenes probably trying to make it so Tess doesn't hit me.

Finally Tess just gets sick of speculating. "I was one of you. I worked side by side with your Mom. I'd assume you know about the near apocalypse."

"When the planet came hurtling towards us, yeah, kind of hard to forget."

Tess raised her eyebrows. "I thought you wanted us to start at the beginning." I stop talking.

"Thank you. Anyway, when that happened I went to see my dear brother."

"Who's your brother?"

"I guess Lex didn't tell you as much as you thought he did." Lex is Tess' brother? Tess is a Luthor? I can't believe this didn't come up in my research. I have to learn to be more thorough.

She smirks. "Yes, well, the meeting didn't go as well as I might have hoped. Though, I guess it was a typical Luthor gathering. He stabbed me and I erased his memory because before he died he found out Clark's identity."

"When did Lex die?" I ask.

Mom answers, "He traveled to the Arctic and found the Fortress. He was injured and then was killed in an explosion." I nod.

"Okay, so he was resurrected because Lionel Luthor, our father, assembled pieces of different clones created by Lex before he died. After he stabbed me I went unconscious. I went into coma. But my mind, my consciousness, wasn't bound to my body. It was bound to Lex's body."

"What?" How can someone's mind hitchhike on someone else's body?

Mom flicks her glance over to me to say let Tess tell her story. "It happened because of the toxin that I used to erase Lex's mind. So, I realized that even though he didn't know Clark's identity, he was still dangerous. I knew I had to stop him. So, at night, while he was asleep, when his consciousness is weakest, I would take over his body."

"When she would take over his body she would send Oliver encrypted emails telling him how to help her. Obviously he couldn't figure out how to read them so he came to me, even though it was a little awkward since we just broke up. But after a while I cracked them open without telling Oliver," Mom explains.

Tess picks up the story, "Cadmus had brought me back. Well, unintentionally. It turns out I was some kind of pet project for Checkmate. Checkmate was a secret division of the government that I worked for. They injected me with a form of liquid meteor rock that was intended to give me powers. Cadmus was one of Checkmate's partners. After Checkmate was disabled Cadmus was doing their best to keep tabs on me. When they found out I was dying they sent agents out to save me. It turns out I had an ability that I didn't even know about, telepathy. Cadmus was using me to revive other meteor freaks by connecting me to their computers and through the computers they would access the part of the brain that controls the heartbeat and reconnect everything. "

This is by far the most farfetched story I've ever heard. "Um, okay."

It almost seems as though they rehearsed this. They drop off and pick up the story so seamlessly it's almost impossible that they don't. Mom starts up again. "Once I decoded Tess' emails I found out about the whole Tess in Lex's brain thing. I decided to look deeper into this. I watched the footage of Tess being killed. Leaving the video on I went over to one of the other monitors to do something for whoever was on patrol but when I came back over I saw three people moving the body. I got into the different security cameras and saw that it was Cadmus. After a while I was able to track which computer they were operating from, and after even more time I found out what they did with Tess and how to stop it. I then hacked into the system and took Tess out of the state she was in."

"I then escape and head to one of the buildings Chloe and I bought as a back-up Watchtower, just in case something was to happen."

"I knew where Tess was going and met her there. She told her side of the story and I told mine. We've been moving around trying not to get caught and trying to find out where Cadmus' new lab is and how to shut them down."

I get the feeling that story time is over so I decide to ask a question. "Why not use your telepathy?" I direct at Tess.

"While Cadmus was able to tap into my ability I haven't figured out how to control it yet. When I focus on using it I can only hear noise but I can't single out a single voice or search for what I need to find." She gets cut off by the noise of the door opening on the other side of the building. Mom and Tess look up at each other and Tess whispers, "Cadmus."

"You're sure?" I ask.

She nods, "I can hear them."

Mom points to her head and Tess nods.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

"Tess, you controlled it!" Mom starts to celebrate.

"Nice job, Tess, but there is people trying to kill us in the other room so if we could focus," I urge.

Mom nods, "Right." She grabs the files spread across the desk as Tess goes over to the window and opens it. She gives Mom a boost up and she hops through the window.

She nods toward the window and looks at me. "Kid, you freeze a lot, let's move." I snap back to reality. I don't know if you've noticed but I do have a tendency to freeze when I panic. I mean these people are trained killers, and they're after us. Tess, still on her knee gives me a boost as well. I hop through the window and land in an alleyway. I look around for Mom. I see Mom at the end and I run over to her. I hear gunshots.

Tess. Is she okay? Is she hit? What if she's dead? I look to Mom. "Believe me, she's fine." Just then Tess jumps through the window.

She runs over to us with a gun in her hand. "Two down, three to go. Let's go!" Tess rushes.

She points around the corner. "Go, I'll take them as they come out."

Mom nods. I've never seen her so willing to obey someone. She may trust Tess to take care of herself, but I have no reason to believe she can be left alone with three trained killers. "You'll die!"

Mom grabs my wrist, "Trust me she can hold her own, but if we don't move, we'll be the dead ones!" We run. She takes me down the street and into yet another alleyway.

We crouch down behind a dumpster. "Why do you keep leaving her?" I demand. I may not know Tess all that well, but I still don't want her to die.

"She's held her own against the meteor infected, evil aliens, a whole division of the government, and psychotic grannies from other planets. This is nothing for her. We, however, would be dead quicker than you could blink."

I hear another gunshot, silence, gunshot, silence, and yet another gunshot. "Do you think she's okay?"

"She said there were three left didn't she?" We sit in silence, our backs pressed up against the dumpster, not wanting to risk that Tess didn't beat all of them, and there happens to be one passing by the alleyway at this very moment.

A voice surprises us. We both jump a mile in the air. "You know, these are trained killers. Hiding behind a dumpster would be a fairly easy find for them," Tess points out.

Mom rolls her eyes and starts to get up. "Maybe, but they only know about you, not us." Tess shrugs and smirks obviously satisfied at the fact that she scared us so badly. She turns back towards the street. She walks ahead, and Mom and I walk side-by-side behind her.

"Do you ever get used to that?" I inquire.

"It's kind of like how Uncle Clark randomly disappears. You always think you're ready for it, but you never are."

"Fantastic," I mumble. Mom and I catch up with Tess. We walk around for a while, seemingly aimlessly.

After a while I decide that I'd like to know where we're going. Tess seems to know where she's going but she comes across like she always knows what she's doing, even though she probably doesn't. "Where exactly are we going?"

Tess' eyes flick towards me and back ahead so quickly you would have thought that I was just a bug on her windshield. "Calm down, kid. I know where I'm going. Time, anyone?" she asks after a moment. I look down at my watch.

"3 AM." I'm surprised, it didn't feel this late. I would have thought I would be more tired.

"The excitement keeps you on your toes. Hard to get tired when you're being hunted," Tess answers, seemingly reading my mind. Then I remember she probably is. Which brings us around to a major question, "You controlled your telepathy, before, back at the warehouse," I say looking back at Tess.

"Momentarily, yes," she replies.

"You did it just now."

She shakes her head. "No, that was just a lucky guess," she explains, embarrassing me a little bit. I guess she does strike me as someone who would be able to tell what you're thinking.

Mom snorts, "It stops being lucky after a while, Tess." And that means I'm not the only one that doesn't particularly enjoy her 'lucky' guesses.

We walk in quiet a bit longer before I inquire further. "How'd you do it?"

"I'd assume adrenaline had something to do with it. I generally work better under pressure. And when we've tested it before, there was certainly a lack of that." Suddenly, she stops again and holds out both of her arms to stop Mom and I as well.

"What's wrong?" Mom whispers.

"Did you hear that?" Tess whispers back.

Mom shakes her head and I freeze again. "Get down!" Tess exclaims, pulling me down. Something explodes above our head. We roll over onto our backs. There are two girls in front of us, one's blond and the other brunette.

Mom and Tess whisper two different names. Tess whispers, "Bette," and Mom, "Alicia." Mom looks to Tess and Tess nods.

"Alicia, what's going on?" Mom begins to negotiate.

"Who are you?" the blond, who I'm assuming is Alicia, answered.

The brunette steps in. "The enemy," she replied, glaring at Tess, "Go, I'll deal with this." At that the blond disappears in a haze of green mist. Mom and Tess get up and start moving toward the angry brunette, who by process of elimination must be Bette.

I still haven't moved. Mom whispers, "Run, Mike."

I shake my head, "No, I'm not leaving." I get up, but stay a little bit behind them.

"You're going to lose this time, Tess. You're going to pay for what you did to us," she says, obviously angry.

Tess starts trying to talk her down. "Look, Bette, I know you're angry and you have every right to be, but I've changed. I'm not the person I was before. I really am sorry about what I did to you, but nothing can change the past, no matter how much we wish we could. If there was any way to repay you-"

"There is. You can pay with your life," she growls.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

Well, that's not good. Tess takes a deep breath before continuing. "It doesn't have to be this way. You can help people."

Bette is starting to lose her already feisty temper. "Yes, it does. These people helped me. I owe them this."

"Just like I did? Like I helped you? If you think what I did to you was bad, these people are worse. They're using you. I was going to let you go, these people, they won't. You know too much, they will kill you."

She turns her head slightly over to us, never taking her eyes off of Bette. "Go, run, both of you."

Bette's eyes light up, literally, there are orange balls floating around in her eyes. "No!" she screams.

Tess snaps her head back to look Bette straight in the eye with a kind of fury that far surpasses Bette's. Bette takes a step back. "You don't need them. You want me, and I'm not trying to run," she turns her head back to us, "Go." I flick my eyes back over to Bette and she doesn't object.

Mom looks over at me, and then back at Tess. "Save the kid, Chloe." Mom sighs and looks back at me. She shakes her head and grabs my arm. She starts running down the street.

"We can't leave her!" I yell as Mom drags me down the street. We turn the corner and I'm still looking back.

She leads me down the street. "Stop!" she lets go of me. We're breathing heavy.

"Stay here, I have to go back and help her, but I won't go anywhere if you don't promise to stay here!"

"Okay, okay, go," I pretend to submit. Mom nods and takes off back to where Tess was. After she turns the corner I take off in the opposite direction, hoping to cut around, maybe through one of the alleyways. I turn randomly, hoping that I might make my way over. Finally, I come through an alleyway that leads out to the street where Tess and Bette are facing off.

"Stop talking! Chloe, I don't want to hurt you. You haven't done anything to me, or anyone else. Tess is the one that needs to pay. If you leave I won't come after you, but if you stay, I 'll have no choice but to hurt you," Bette threatens.

Tess' eyes flick up as though she just realized something. Then she really freaks me out, I hear her voice in my head. "Kid, leave, you're only going to get hurt."

"No," I argue back, surprising even myself.

"Stay hidden," she says breaking the link.

"Well, you leave me with no choice," Bette replies, shooting blasts in Tess and Mom's direction. It's aimed right for Tess. Mom dives right, she lands in the street and looks back up at Bette. Tess does a back hand spring to avoid it. I thought that only worked in movies. Mom's back up and beside Tess. They charge her, dodging the different blasts Bette sends at them. Tess tosses Mom a pistol. She catches it, still running toward Bette.

Bette aims one at their heads and they both slide under it all the while continuing their advances. They each shoot one of her shoulders. "Agh!" she cries out. Tess delivers a spin kick to the head, successfully knocking her out.

"You can come out now, kid," Tess calls out. I come out of the alleyway.

"You do not know how to stay put do you?" Mom asks. I shrug.

"Not really, no." While the rest of us are making light, Tess is still dead-serious.

"We better keep moving. There might be more coming."

Tess turns to leave but Mom stops her. "What about Bette? She'll bleed to death. We can't just leave her," she pauses, "She's just confused."

"I'm sorry if I stopped feeling bad for her after she tried to kill me…twice!" Tess also pauses, "Grab her, and let's go." Mom grabs Bette.

"The next place is just a few blocks away." We walk in silence. Tess keeps looking at Bette warily. We finally reach the safe-house. It's a rundown old house that's boarded up and everything. We walk in the door. "Lay her down on the couch," Tess orders.

Tess goes into another room and comes back with handcuffs. "Where did you get those?" I ask.

"Did you really think I didn't have them?" She replies.

Tess chains her to the couch. "Bandages?" Mom reminds her.

Tess disappears again and comes back with bandages. "I'll wrap her up. You two need to talk," Tess says.

Mom replies, "Yes, we definitely do."


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

We sit in the kitchen and Mom just stares at me for a while. "I thought you weren't going to pursue this. Lana told me you stopped by. You told her that you would drop this. And did I hear Tess say you paid Lex a vist?" she asked, getting increasingly angry.

"Yeah…" I mutter.

"Mike, talk to me, why did you go to Lex? You know what he's capable of!" she yells, " Why were you so determined to find Tess?"

I look down at my hands that are folded on the table. "Well, no one would give me a straight answer. I got the feeling I needed to know, that it was important."

"You're grounded for at least a month, that is, if we survive this," she adds under her breathe.

I'm just about to apologize when Tess calls from the other room, "She's waking up." We get up and go back into the living room where Bette is in fact waking up.

She moans and moves her head from side to side, Tess did bandage up her shoulders, even though I had my doubts that she actually would. Her eyes flicker open as she tries to focus them. Once they come into focus she seems to realize that it's Tess standing over her.

She cries out, "No!" she pushes herself into the corner of the couch, trying to back away from Tess. But in her haste, she didn't notice that she was handcuffed to the table beside her, and was immediately thwarted. She pulled her arm, probably sending a tearing pain up her arm. "Ahhh," she shrieks.

Mom runs over to her side to comfort her. "Bette, you're okay," she soothes, "you're at a safe house. We're not going to hurt you."

"Unless your try something, then we'll be forced to respond accordingly," Tess threatens.

Bette attempts to catch her breath and calm down. I'd guess she was trying to think up a plan to get out of here, but quickly realizes that there's not many options, especially since Tess have a death grip on her gun.

I almost feel bad for Bette. Anyone can see she's scared, even though she's doing her best to hide it. She's probably only twenty, and being held captive by Tess. That would make anyone uncomfortable. I'm on her side and she scares the heck out of me.

Bette starts looking over the room and her gaze falls upon me. "Who's the kid?"

"Temporary, not that it matters to you," Tess answers. I can't help but wonder what exactly temporary means. Mom wouldn't let her hurt me but, it does plant a little seed of fear in me. I unintentionally gulp.

"What do you want?" Bette asks.

"Nothing," Mom replies.

Tess cuts in, "Chloe insisted that we bring you back here, to makes sure you were ok."

"You were going to leave me to die?"

"You couldn't have died from that. Besides your little blond friend would have come to pick you up."

Mom cuts in, "Which raises the question, who else is alive?"

Bette takes a deep breath and seems to debate on how best to answer that question without making her bosses angry and without making Tess angry. "If I may," I look to Mom for the okay to continue, she nods, "I'm really not being biased when I say while your bosses may be violent, Tess is a more immediate, if not altogether bigger, problem for you to deal with now." Tess' gaze slides over to me with an indistinguishable look. Whatever way she meant it, it helped prove my point.

"Alicia, Tina Greer, Greg Arkin, Ian Randell, Tim Westcott, and Linda Lake," She answers, not looking any of us in the eye.

Tess looks to Mom for a sign of recognition. Mom's face looks defeated, almost. Whatever you want to call it, she's not happy. "I take it you know who these people are," Tess says.

Mom nods, "Unfortunately."

"I'd assume you have access to you-know-what," she says to Tess. I have to guess that you-know-what is Watchtower.

Tess smirks, "Of course, how else could I cut the kid off?"

"Look them up, explain to Mike. I'll watch Bette."

"Come on, kid," Tess nods over to the kitchens.

A/N: If anyone is still reading this please post a review because I'm kind of starting to lose the gumption to keep this story going. seriously, just let me know someone still cares what happens.


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

Tess leads me into the kitchen and gestures for me to sit down. I listen, mostly because I 'd like her to explain how she knows everyone, and why everyone's so cryptic when it comes to the woman in the picture. Tess doesn't sit, she seems the type to try to make you feel uncomfortable and prefers to be in a position of power at all times, so while she's probably feeling particularly helpless, she's grasping for power in any case she can find it, even if it's just from standing instead of sitting. "Don't expect me to tell you everything about me."

I also get the feeling she enjoys being cryptic, that she doesn't like to divulge information. But I won't push her, she seems the type that the more you push, the less information you're likely to get. "I never had the clearest idea of right and wrong, so I made some decisions I wish I hadn't," she starts to explain, "I'm not going to go into detail, but know, it wasn't pretty. Once it was clear that I turned myself around Clark and Oliver let me into their little circle of heroes. I ran Watchtower. At that point, your Mom was operating outside of the ring, so I worked on my own for a brief period of time. When she came back we worked together, took shifts, and formed an unbeatable hacking tag-team. That's why I was able to block you, because I already had all the passcodes. Your Mom and I have been using Watchtower this entire time."

This explains a lot. It's why her picture was in Watchtower, because she worked there and sacrificed herself for the team. But everyone else seemed to have fond memories of her when they explained who she was, albeit cryptically, Oliver seemed more emotionally invested in it, I just don't know why, or which way it went. Did he hate her, or was it…something else? "What about Uncle Oliver?'

I physically saw another barrier go up. The feelings must not be one way, whether positive or negative, I just don't know. "He had a different reaction than everyone else, why?"

In all honesty Tess seems just as perplexed as I am, but with people like her it's hard to know whether or not it's fake. "I don't know," she stated simply, but a network of emotions seemed to be weaving itself behind her guarded eyes. She looks down at the ground, probably trying to hide the trickle of emotion working its way through her eyes.

"I don't buy it."

Tess' head snaps up and her eyes lock on mine. I immediately regret saying that. "What?"

I understand that she's the kind of person that will respect you more if you don't back down. I can't backtrack now, no matter how much I want to. "I believe that you do know."

"I caused him more pain than I did for anyone else."

"How?"

I can see she's not a fan of my tact here, but I keep pushing through. "He had a lot of faith in me," she answers, her defenses wearing down.

"Why?" I ask. Why would he have so much faith in her if she made some bad decisions that I didn't press for details on? What did she do that earned so much trust?

And just like that her defenses go up and block out any emotion that might shine through. "It doesn't matter."

Based on the controversy I did see in her eyes I decide not to press the matter. "What did he say?" she momentarily gives into the curiosity that's obviously clawing at her.

"It didn't make much sense," I freeze, realizing just how much it took her to ask that simple question. She relinquished the upper hand for a moment, she let go of her need for superiority to ask that question. And I realize just how much the answer must mean to her, that she actually cares what he thinks. I decide to give to her what Uncle Oliver was asking for, "Mercy," I say, looking down at my hand. I know she reacted somehow, and I know she wouldn't have wanted me to see it, so I just keep looking down.

"Your Mom wanted us to look up the names. Linda Lake was one of them," she starts typing into her phone. She has Watchtower, the largest compilation of information in the world, the world's largest and most powerful computer (second to the fortress), on her phone.

"It's a really good phone." My head snaps up. These lucky guesses stop being lucky at that. I open my mouth to say something along these lines but she stops me. "That time I controlled it." She gives herself a satisfied smile, still staring at her phone and occasionally scrolling.

"Okay, so Linda Lake is meteor infected. She can morph into water and, apparently," she adds, placing emphasis on apparently, "found out Clark's secret at one point. She is now dead, supposedly. So she could have her memory or not, she would still want us dead."

I mumble, "Fantastic." She nods and rolls her eyes.

"Yeah. Next name would be…," she trails off, "There was a Greer."

I offer, "Tina, I think." She nods and starts typing into her phone again.

She gives a brief biography, "Knows Clark's secret. Shape shifting abilities courtesy meteor rock. And she had a strange obsession with Lana. Supposedly deceased, thanks to Clark. I'd bet doesn't have her memory."

"Why's that?" I question.

"Because as far as I know, Lana has not been attacked." She begins typing and scrolling again.

"What about the blond? Mom called her Alicia."

"Already on it. Alicia Baker, ex of Clark, in on the secret. Teleportation abilities, as we know. First time around, she tried to kill Lana due to insane rage of jealousy, but when she came back the second time, used red K to make Clark marry her. It wasn't legal but, still. Apparently at that point she was only a bit eccentric, but not psychotic. She was murder by Tim Westcott."

"Isn't he one of the names?"

Tess nods and starts scrolling and typing again. "Tim Westcott, Mr. Moral. Apparently he used his abilities to kill anyone that he didn't see as moral. He can morph into sand. He killed Alicia, and tried to murder Lana. These team meetings have got to be interesting."

I chuckle a little bit. I can only imagine. 'I killed you because you were immoral.' I'd bet that would go over well. '"Then there was Arkin," Tess throws out. Again, typing and scrolling. Her concentration seemingly put completely on the phone even though I know she's watching me, and everything else at the same time.

"okay," she begins, "Arkin, Greg Arkin, nicknamed Bug Boy. Also had strange obsession with Lana. He was crazy, but Clark saw him at the Smallville High reunion, and he thanked Lois for what Clark did. Obviously, does not have his memory, and was either kidnapped and mind-wiped, or died and mind-wiped. His abilities," she pauses and shakes her head, " there are a number of them, are super strength, speed, agility, clinging to solid surfaces, enhanced jumping, and of course what kind of Bug Boy would he be if he couldn't spit webs." I make a face. Come on, that's just gross.

She looks up from her phone and at me. "What was the name of the last one?"

"um, it was like Randell or something."

She nods and proceeds to type and scroll. "Ian Randell, Randell is a last name. He can multiply himself, kidnapped Lana and your Mom. Also supposed to be dead."

Tess gets interrupted when the door gets kicked open with a bang. I hear Mom gasp from here. Tess grabs her pistols and knives. Tess tosses Mom a pistol. There, in the doorway, stands the group we just studied up on.


	10. Chapter 10

It takes me a moment to realize that I'm completely unarmed. A woman, probably mid-forties, blond hair, and brown eyes, steps to the front. "Look, darling, we don't want to fight. We just want our leader back."

Tess snorts. "That explains the back-up." Tess is staring at her with a cold stare that's probably scaring her, but she won't let her see it.

After a pause Tess inquires, "Do you know who I am?"

The woman shakes her head and says, "And I don't care."

Tess smirks and nods, "Just checking." That would be enough to drive anyone crazy, so it's slightly understandable when she sends water shooting in Tess' direction. So the one in charge, the blond, is Linda Lake. I just realized how ridiculous that pun is. Anyway, Tess sidesteps the attack. "Whatever happened to the passive method?" she taunts.

Mom shoots Tess a desperate what-are-you-doing look. Tess doesn't notice. Bette is still chained to the table and sitting on the couch. She seems conflicted? I don't know what Mom said to her but obviously it had some impact. She was worried about her bosses earlier, then again, I would trust Tess to protect me, I'd be a little worried she would kill me, but she wouldn't let anyone else do it. As Bette's dealing with whatever internal struggle she's dealing with Linda growls, "Give us Plastique." I'd assume that's Bette.

Tess does something that we're going to regret, a lot. She smirks and says, "No." At once they all surge forward toward us using their powers. I freeze again, I feel it. Everything is moving in slow motion. Tess shoots at Alicia and slashes with her dagger at a glob of water that was rushing her. Mom is surrounded by many of who I can only assume is Ian Randell. There's something moving beneath her feet. She noticed it and twists her heel into the ground, and consequently into whatever was beneath her. Someone cries out. Mom then shoots one of the Ians. The rest of the Ians disappear.

A glob of white what I'd assume is web comes shooting at me. I stagger backwards. I hear Mom yell Tess' name.

"I'll cover you," she reassures. I steadily realize I can't breathe. The webbing is so thick and so dense that even air can't get through. Someone begins clawing at the webbing. They break through where my nose is. I breathe in the sweet, crisp night air. "Work at it yourself," Mom commands.

Gunshot.

Gunshot.

They're both fired near me. I tear at where my eyes are. I can see it getting thinner, letting more and letting more light through. I hear Tess grunt. There's the sound of someone sliding backward. I claw more furiously. Another grunt, someone makes hard contact with someone else. I'm still desperately trying to get this stuff off my face. It won't come off. It's sticking to my hands. I rake my hands across my face but nothing more is coming off. My hands are numb. I'm steadily getting sweatier. It's all over them.

Another gunshot. Slide. Crash. Explosion. I'm pulling the gunk of my hand. I'm having trouble breathing again, this time due to nothing but nerves. There's another slap. Tess grunts. A body hits the floor, another hits. Chains break, Bette's loose. I go for my eyes again. Air moves past me on the right. I finally get it all off. There are four people standing, Bette facing Tess, and a guy facing Mom.

The man shoots a web toward Mom, she sidesteps. Bette shoots at Tess' feet. She jumps backward. They all duke it out. Explosion here, web-shot there. Gunshot, stab, slash, another gunshot. Bette sends random energy blasts. Tess dodges alternating between backflips, jumps, side-steps and spin moves.

Mom takes a shot at who I now know is Greg Arkin. She slides under a head shot. She spin-kicks from under him. He falls backward.

I'm so engulfed in the fight playing out before me that I forget to watch my own back. A thin, but strong arm wraps itself around my neck. A gun is pressed up against my head. "Stop," she commands, "or I'll shoot him." I see the panic race through Mom's body. Tess freezes rigidly. She slowly turns around so as not to scare whoever has me. Panic is coursing through my body so predominantly that I hear my pulse, hear my head pound.

I lose focus. "What do you want?" a voice, maybe Tess, requests. Her voice echoes and drifts off until I only hear my pulse and feel the gun burrowing its way into my skull.

"The boss wants you back. He wasn't finished with you," the person behind me says. My breathing becomes heavier and louder until it completely engulfs everything. And then I hear nothing, I pass out.

A/N:I know it's a shorter one but it was my best action scene ever, and I knew if I prolonged it, it wouldn't be as good. Please review!


	11. Chapter 11

My eyes flutter open and Mom's face comes into focus. "Mike, come on, get up." She glances backward. She's worried about something. My head is pounding. I'm lying on the floor. I sit up and a shooting pain goes tearing through my head. I reach up and grab it. I scan the room. They're all gone. Bette, who I thought was second guessing , included. "Where's Tess?" I grumble.

A pained and panicked look flashes across Mom's face. "They took her." I look down at the ground in front of me. I'm vaguely aware of Mom running around grabbing weapons and putting them into bags.

"It's my fault. It's my fault," I mutter. I couldn't hold my own. I lost focus. And Tess took the fall for me. I didn't get the feeling she cared about me at all, but obviously I was wrong. I guess I should have been able to tell. I mean, the only reason she showed herself to me was because she didn't want me to take the fall for her kill. She knew I would only slow them down, but she told Mom I should stay with them because Cadmus would find me. And now…

Who knows what'll happen to her? "Why do they want her?"

Mom shakes her head slightly, as though trying to gently pry the answer out of her brain. "I don't know."

"Who is running this?"

"I don't know."

A fit of anger overtakes me. Anger at the lack of answers, anger at the absence of Tess, anger at the fact that nothing ever seems to go well for an extended period of time. "Why? Why don't you know? You've been researching for two and a half years, and yet you still know nothing. You've magically been able to figure out more since I've arrived than you have in all that time! Are you even trying?" I yell.

"I've been trying!" she yells back, "I've been trying," she near whimpers.

I force myself to calm down. I ask the most important question. "Where did they take her?"

This time a sense of empowerment takes hold. "I don't know, but I plan on finding out." I check the time. It's 5 AM.

"Come on, we need to head to Watchtower." Mom extends her hand out to pull me up. After hesitating a moment I grab her hand and pull myself up.

"Thanks."

She nods and goes to grab the bag full of what I'd assume is weapons. I walk over to the door, head still swimming a little bit, when I kick something. I walk over to it and pick it up. It's Tess' phone. "Mom," I call her over.

Looking at the phone in my hand, she walks over to me. "What is that?"

I hand it to her. "A phone, Tess' phone." She takes it gingerly, as though she was afraid she was going to crack in two simply by touching it wrong. She unlocks it and her eyes widen. She mutters, "She knew this would happen."

"What?" I say, alarmed.

"She knew this would happen," Mom repeats, "She must have found the address right before we were ambushed. She wants us to get back-up before we charge into this place. But I don't know if it's a good idea to bring them."

Ok, well that's downright ridiculous. "Why?" I ask drawing out each sound.

"These people probably know about Clark. Or they at least are definitely experimenting on meteor rock. Oliver has a tendency not to act rationally when Tess is involved, and the last thing we need is Oliver running in without a plan." I agree by nodding my head.

I draw the conclusion Mom is dancing around. "So, we're on our own."

"Basically? Yeah," she says outright with just enough humor to lighten the mood but not too much that it seems forced. It's very easy for it to feel forced in a situation as shocking as this.

Mom begins typing into Tess' phone as we walk out of the sad excuse for a house. She freezes in her tracks. "Okay, this way," she says, pointing. We walk swiftly, but not so swiftly that we're running, because neither of us are eager to see who's holding Tess or what they're doing to her. All we know about them both is that they're not pretty.

Mom stops in front of a large, dark building that's the picture of what you would expect an evil layer to look like, big, dark, and scary. I can practically see Tess being dragged in, but can only imagine the fear that must have been gripping her. Though, I cannot imagine that she gave them the satisfaction of knowing about that fear.

"Let's go," Mom whimpers. She turns down the alley to the right of the alley and I follow on her heels.

The side of the building is just as daunting as the front. I decide to take the initiative and try the door. It didn't work, if Tess was here she would probably say, "You really thought that was going to work?"

"Man," she sighs, "it says there's a door on the roof, but…"

"The roof?"

She gives a half-hearted shrug; "Yeah…" she trails off. I start to move over toward the fire escape. I sigh again and begin to go up. I hear Mom follow behind me. The staircase creaks as each foot comes in contact with the rusted metal, and frankly I expect it to come crashing down at any given moment. We reach the top and slowly begin to realize just how far the roof is from the top of this fire escape.

I look back at Mom who is three stairs below me. I motion for her to get up on my shoulder. "Get up, you can pull me up after you get up there." Mom's pretty tiny, and I'm no squirt, so I should be able to get her up there no problem. The majorly important word in that sentence is 'should'. After all, she is in boots with a little bit of a heel. It' s not a huge heel but it certainly won't feel fantastic.

I squat down and she gives me her hands as she steps up onto my shoulders. She slips off right away, and I'm pretty sure took all the skin off my back with her. "Sorry!" she exclaims quietly, "Are you okay?"

I bite down on my lip and nod, my back still facing her so she can't see my face. I straighten up and stretch out my back before going down again. We do the same thing, except this time she stays on. The arches on her feet settle themselves onto my shoulders and lock in place. I move closer to the building and she lets go of one of my hands and moving to grab onto a ledge conveniently built into the side.

Mom does the same with her other hand. I grasp onto her ankles and she reaches up to grab the roof to pull herself up. I steadily raise myself, careful not to make her topple over. She pulls herself up and turns to pull me up. it wasn't very smooth and my chin is all scratched up, but otherwise it went a lot smoother than expected.

She was right. There is a door, and we get lucky because it's unlocked. We race down the stairs and through a few hallways, carefully listening for any voices. I hear a voice and stop. Slowly, I open the door. What I see horrifies me. This person is unstoppable; this mission is arguably hopeless because the person holding Tess is Clark.


	12. Chapter 12

I never believed people's hearts ever actually skip a beat. The concept just seems ridiculous. How could something like that happen? Well, now I'm a believer because while people say it skips a single beat, it felt like mine skipped nine. I couldn't breathe. The shock was simply too much. I softly let the door close unable to watch him stand over her any longer. Mom is just as shocked as I am. Her face is ghostly pale.

She mutters, "Clark Luthor," under her breathe, to herself, but just loud enough that I could hear it. While that makes more sense it doesn't take away the fact that the man holding, probably the only person that could help us captive, his only vulnerability that is a meteor rock that is rare to everyone except people we don't want to have it.

I press my ear to the door, hoping to catch even small snippets of what they are trying to say. Tess' voice is the one that answers my desperate plea for any indication that Tess is alive. "What is it you want? You obviously didn't bring me out here for the pleasure of my company because we both know no one enjoys it."

Clark Luthor chuckles. "I do find you amusing if nothing else."

Tess scoffs back at him in an act of defiance. "Good to see someone does," she retorts.  
Clark begins the classic villain monologue on their plan that usually, and hopefully, leads to their ultimate downfall. "It's pretty simple, Tess. You and I both know why you're here."

"I don't-"

Clark cuts her off, "Yes, you do. Because you would have wanted to know why I had you in the first place, why I saved you and kept you alive. Once you figured out about your little ability you would have tried to master it. After all, if you have a tool in your belt why not learn how to use it? And I know for a fact you would not take the idea of not being able to control it very well."

Tess' voice begins again, saying two things at once. Except one is in my head and one is out loud. Out loud she says, "But what do you need me for?", but in my head she says, "The rest of the cavalry is waiting outside, ready to charge, right?" She already knows the answer.

Mom was put in the link too, so she answers, "We're all that's coming." I feel it in my head that Tess mentally rolls her eyes.

Clark begins again. "Because you are going to make me a fortune."

"I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but there's a fortune waiting for you one universe over."

"They know how to kill me there. Everyone does, I have to start over."

"Yeah, because the first thing I do when I want a fresh start is kidnap the alternate version of my half-sister." Tess has to get that condescending snark under control.

Apparently Clark has some different thoughts on the matter because he says, "You're cute when you're feisty."

"I aim to please," she spats.

Tess brings up the mental link again."I scanned the area. There's no one here and the machine they were using to use me runs on meteor rocks, among other things."

Mom cuts in, "That's our lifeline, huh?"

"Exactly," she replies.

So now Mom and I have to find the machine and, locate where the meteor rock is stored in the machine, and get it back, all without Clark hearing or seeing us, even with his superpowers. Needless to say, it's going to be difficult. "Where is it?" Mom logically asks.

"I don't know." She sighs and hangs her head. She gets up from her squatted position. Her arm moves in a waving motion encouraging me to follow. I leap up and follow her down the hall. We look through door after door until we find a machine menacing looking enough to connect to two people's brains and bring someone back to life. Well, that gave it away as well as the fact that it was glowing green.

"You guys should hear this," Tess' voice rings through my head. My vision goes cloudy until it' s completely replaced by what I can only assume is Tess' view.

"And what will you use me for? Why bring back dead meteor freaks?"

Clark chuckles, "Kind of hypocritical, don't you think?," he clarifies, "to call them that. I'm planning on selling them."

Tess presses a little more. "To whom, may I ask?" She asks without actually asking, but more demanding an answer.

"Gangs, companies, the government, anyone that will buy," he explains.

"Who in the government would buy a meteor freak? It's illegal, and I'm sure all the parties involved know that."

"I'm just as sure that they are perfectly aware."

"Oh, really? Than who in the government was willing to spend, what I'm sure is a pretty penny, and commit a felony, and for what purpose? Because obviously they wouldn't risk going to jail if they weren't doing something they firmly believe in. What did they disagree with so strongly that they'd be willing to cross that line?"

Clark looks at her, considering. "I don't now all the whys, and frankly, I don't care. But I do know the name." I could feel Tess' intrigue buried under the desperate grasping for time.

Clark, wanting to mess with Tess' head, has extreme confidence in his looks. He leans down and whispers in Tess' ear, as though it was some big secret. "Amanda Waller." She cuts the link.


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 13  
If I did know any better I would have thought Mom had just been punched in the gut. Her eyes were squinted closed with her mouth pressed into a firm line. She slowly opened her eyes and relieved the pressure of her lips. She takes a deep breath, locks eyes with and says, "Let's move."

She walks over to the machine and begins to analyze it. There is, what seems like a vault near the base of it. That vault is glowing green. Mom reaches down and grabs a bobby pin that's tucked into her boot. She comes up with it and smirks at it.

She then positions herself on the floor in front of the vault and inserts the bobby pin. "Tess used to pull her hair back a lot, still does, but not as much as she used to. That way there was always a bobby pin on hand. Even when she wore it down she usually had one tucked away somewhere on her. It made her very difficult to tie down, literally." Mom's just babbling now. She has a tendency to do that when she's panicked. Aunt Lois does it, too.

Her eyes narrow in concentration as she tries to maneuver the narrow piece of plastic through the lock. The lock clicks and Mom smiles in triumph. "Atta boy," she says seemingly, and probably unhealthily, to the vault. She lifts out the huge hunk of Kryptonite. She tosses it up and snatches it out of the air, still smiling.

I hate to take this moment of pride from her but Tess obviously cut the link for a reason. "Mom, Tess."

She snaps back into serious mode and says, "Right, let's go." We run back down the hallway. And creep back up to the door. We squat down again when we hear voices.

"If you help me, than I will help you regain your company, and you can live your life with minimal interruptions. Once a day, at most. Or your other option being, I can take you, put you in a stasis, and you'll never get to do anything ever again." Well, that's encouraging.

Tess says, "You want to come in and save the day now?" It takes a moment to realize that she said it in my head and not of loud. If she had said that out loud we probably wouldn't still be alive.

She has a point, we probably should save her neck right now. I look at Mom and she nods. I swing the door open and Mom rushes in with the Kryptonite. Clark instantly turns a green that rivals the meteor rock in Mom's hand. He drops to the ground. "Kid! Untie me!"

"Right!" I exclaim. I rush over and begin to fiddle with the knots. Once I get one of her hands undone she shoos me away muttering something about useless. She undoes they rest of the knots and goes to stand over Clark. "How?" he groans.

"You were played. I made you think I couldn't control the telepathy. I could. I was in contact with them the whole time. I scanned your mind to find Kryptonite. You played right not my hands. And gave me some useful information along the way," she added as an afterthought.

"Did you bring it?" Tess asks. Mom nods and reaches into the bag that I forgot she brought. She pulls out a long, silver, octagonal cylinder.

"The mirror box," Clark grunts.

Tess takes the mirror box and squats down next to Clark. "The only way to stop the pain is take it and go." She holds the box out for him to take. He looks at the box skeptically. He grunts and takes it. In one quick jerking motion he turns it and in a flash of light disappears.

Tess gets up and turns toward Mom and I. "Next stop, Waller." Mom nods.

"We passed a file room while looking for the Kryptonite. Maybe he kept records of his sales."

"Who's Waller?" I question. Obviously she's a big deal and not someone we want to mess with but I gotta know. What makes her so horrible?

"She used to be the head of a rogue branch of the government, Checkmate. I used to work for her, she's ruthless and her sense of morality is about as our Clark's sense of immorality," Tess answers.

We leave the room and head back down the long hallway we already traveled through. The sparkling clean white walls gave the impression of a evil hospital. Mom leads, certain of where she's going. She pushes open one of the plastic doors. There are a few filing cabinets placed throughout the room, in various corners of the room. There's a desk pushed up against the back wall with a computer and a few papers scattered across the top. "We'll each take one."

"You two search the cabinets, I'll check the computer. I have a feeling that'll turn up more results than anything else," Tess explains. She bends over the computer, typing and scrolling, looking through anything that might even remotely give any information as to the location of Amanda Waller.

I make my way over to the nearest filing cabinet. I search through the files, all containing facts and figures but not anything that might even remotely be useful. Drawer after drawer, each containing nothing remotely substantial. I pull open the bottom drawer, expecting the same things to greet me but am mildly surprised to find only a single file hanging in the drawer. I pull it out and open it, where it gets even more strange, the only hung in the file is a napkin. Written on it is an address, located in Suicide Slums.

Tess and I both exclaim something at the same time,"Got something!" Tess looks up at me and raises a single eyebrow.

"Well?"

"Oh, right," I shake my head, "it's an address, in Suicide Slums."

Mom makes her way over to me and takes the crumpled napkin. She nods at Tess. "According to this Clark was getting a little suspicious since Waller navel came to meet him, but just sent a messenger each time, even when he told her who he was. Apparently, she was an ally of his in his universe. I'm just wondering as to why he believed she was so... universally consistent."

"Unless she came to him."

Tess shakes her head slightly back and forth. "It's not her style," she says, resuming to type.

Tess seems to come across something. She tilts her head to the left slightly. "We're in luck."

"Not what I'd call it," I mutter.

"Mike," Mom warns.

I stop. "Apparently he had a meeting with someone, supposedly, Waller, herself. Bt I wouldn't put money on it since she's yet to show up so far."

"The address is all the way across town. What time is the meeting?" I question.

"Seven," she answers bluntly. That leaves us more than enough time. I breathe a sigh of relief.

"Don't relax yet, kid. We've got to walk." Tess smirks and I send a death glare her way. She doesn't notice. She types a bit more on the keyboard before standing up to full height and walks out the door.

"You know the way?"

Tess turns and looks at me like I have five heads. Mom comes up from behind me and pats my shoulder. "She doesn't have to. The phone does." I hang my head before walking after them.

-an hour and a half later-

This is completely ridiculous. Tess and Mom were right of course. It took an hour and a half to walk to the address. And on top of that we're in the slums, so a) the scenery isn't exactly what it could be, and b) we could be jumped at any minute. Not that I don't think we could take whoever was brilliant enough to attack us. Tess walks through the doors of what I assume is the address we were looking for. She didn't stop, she didn't hesitate, she just walked right in like she owned the place. It's amazing she hasn't been killed yet, with a mentality like that. Wait let me rephrase that since technically she did die, it's amazing she's not dead.

The building is a rundown apartment building. I bring out the now even more crumpled napkin. "It says room 2B." We move over to the stairs and climb them two at a time, anxious to get to the bottom of this little mystery. We get to the door and we all just kind of stare at it, not entirely sure what to expect. Tess shakes her head and reaches for the knob, obviously not wanting to stall any longer.

She pushes the door open and is greeted by a lack of anything. The room's completely empty. Whoever's supposed to meet us, or rather, Clark, isn't here yet. There's a window on the back wall, Tess goes and leans against it. Mom, on the other hand, goes for a slightly less subtle approach. She slides down the wall and sits on the floor, elbows propped up on her knees and head resting in her hands. I don't even try to hide m exhaustion. I lay on the floor and stare at the ceiling.

I know I'll probably regret it later. After all if an evil, gun-wielding government agent came through the door an exhausted fifteen year-old sprawled out on the floor would not be a particularly difficult target. But as I said before I am just far too tired to care.

Luckily, my ears didn't stop working or else I wouldn't have heard the footsteps that came pounding their way through the hallway that alerted me to get up.

Tess takes on a blank face that would creep anyone out. Hr gaze turns from one of pure drowsiness, to a cold and calculating glare that would suggest the full night's sleep that none of us got. She crosses her arms over her chest in a way that if I didn't see her being comfortable a few moments prior I would have thought was the most comfortable position you could ever hope to be in.

Mom's eyes now are wide and alert. She doesn't drastically move either but just moves her arms so that they're folded over her still bent knees.

I, however, just scoot up against the wall and out my hands in my lap, probably still looking like I hadn't slept in three months, which is exactly how I feel, to be fair.

All eyes are on the door as the knob twists and the door creaks open. Now, when someone tells you that the person you're expecting is named Amanda, you would logically assume that it would be a woman. Well, the person that walked through the door was certainly not a woman. He was a man, average height, white hair, and an eye-patch.

I look to Mom and Tess for some kind of explanation. Mom's eyes widen slightly in surprise but that's all. Tess cocks her head to the left and smirks in a way that very strongly the look that she would give when saying "I told you so."

I then look at the eyepatch man. His face resorts to a look that says "I see."

No one dares to break the intense silence. He doesn't try to run, but instead attempts to stare Mom and Tess down. I'm completely ignored and merely watch this man tries to threateningly stare down both Mom and Tess at once.

The man, obviously tired of flicking his eyes between the two women says, "It took you longer than I thought it would."

A/N: This won't come into play until later but please let me know if you are a passionate Tollie hater. If them together would ruin the story for you please let me know because I would be perfectly okay with sidestepping that entirely. I'm not even sure I would include it anyway, but if that's the way the story rolls than i would put it in, but i could definitely figure out a way to disregard it entirely. Just leave it in your review. The only reason I'm bringing this up now is I need time to figure out the rest of the storyline. Even if you don't care either way, please reveiw! It's really appreciated.


	14. Chapter 14

A/N: Sorry it took a little longer to update but I always feel like I have to leave it on a cliffhanger and this chapter was particularly difficult to find one for. Review please!

Chapter 14  
"Well, I'm sorry to have disappointed you," Mom incredulously says.

"As we both know Mr. Slade expects nothing but the best from everyone," Tess replies, smoothly. Slade, Slade, I know that name. He was the general that was leading the anti-vigilante movement in the government. Great-Uncle Sam was also part of it but didn't feel as strongly. Slade was infected by the darkness, and therefore had to be sent to the phantom zone until the darkness could be taken out. Last I heard he was comatose. Apparently not.

"So, Mr. Slade-" Tess begins.

Slade interrupts, "General."

Tess raises her eyebrows in mild disbelief, as though she was somewhat shocked that anyone would dare interrupt her. "That would require a certain level of respect. I'd imagine, and this is just a guess," she adds, "that Waller had nothing to do with this, and she is indeed as dead as we all assumed she was. You were simply using her name to lure us here, knowing Luthor was just as careless as we all knew he would be. I know that this is rather important, or else you wouldn't have put so much time or effort into this."

Slade nods his head. "You're just as smart as Waller said you were."

"Hey, at least he's that much closer to the truth. I didn't expect him to have any ties to Waller at all," Mom remarks.

"And you are indeed related to Sam Lane. All of us important government people keep in touch."

"Look, I can tell you're very into dancing around the bush, but I've never been into ring-around-the-Rosie. I'm generally a cut to the chase kind of person so if you could do me a favor and do the same, it'd be greatly appreciated," Mom snaps, her reporter snark kicking in, sounding more like Aunt Lois than I'd ever heard her.

Slade chuckles. "I can do that. I'm here for you two. Frankly, I'm surprised that you let the kid tag along," he nods toward me, "especially with your ruthlessness, Mercer."

"I'm full of surprises."

He gives a knowing nod as if he expected the amount of insults that have been thrown at him since he walked in. "I'll be up-front with you here. I need your help. A ship landed right outside of one of our more remote forts. Unfortunately, we haven't found who or what was in it. I need some help that, I believe only you two can provide without alerting the wrong people."

Tess narrows her eyes at him. Mom questions, "That's all, nothing even remotely shady?"

"I told you everything," Slade replies.

Mom looks over at a speculating Tess, looking for approval. She nods at her before turning her attention to Slade. "Okay."

He looks relived and gives a small triumphant smile, obviously expecting this to be a lot more difficult than it proved to be. "I'll need to bring you to base, have you go through the standard background checks, and get you your credentials. But," he turns to me, "I don't think it's a very good idea for, uh..."

"Mike," I supply.

"Mike," he repeats, "to come along."

"What?" I cried, outraged.

"Unfortunately, the kid's already knee-deep, and I'm sure we've made quite a few people angry since we've embarked on this little mission and if they're going to go after Chloe, Mike's the prime target," Tess reasons her unnaturally cold facade still in place. She still doesn't trust Slade, but she realizes that this is a project she wants to be close to.

Slade's eye travels over to me, before flicking back to Tess. "It'll be dangerous."

"She wouldn't have any part of this if it wasn't," Mom jokes trying to lighten up the death glare Tess is delivering to Slade. She's obviously looking for a reason not to help him. She's trying to show him that she does have an interest in the project.

"Ok," Slade agrees reluctantly. He turns and exits out the door, expecting us to follow. But Mom interrupts once again, "Sorry, but we didn't gotten any sleep last night. So if we could maybe go home, catch some z's then meet up with you that's amazing." I furiously nod my head.

He sighs, "Okay."

Mom pulls out a notepad and a pen and poises to begin writing. Slade scrunches up his eyebrows in question. "Address," she states simply. He gives her directions on how to get to the base saying that there's no proper address for it. Mom flips her notebook shut with a slap. "Thank you," she smiles brightly, much more brightly than I could have managed being as exhausted as she probably is, considering she and Tess haves been running around for over two years like this.

Slade turns to leave again when a thought occurred to me. "Um, we walked here, and I really don't want to walk back home," I blurt out.

For the first time since he entered the room I saw I'm give a somewhat hearty smile. "I can do that. Would you like me to drop you off?"

Tess opens her mouth to argue. Mom extends her hand to Tess to stop her before turning to Slade and giving him a weary smile. "That'd be great." Tess' eyes flash with something unrecognizable but she doesn't say anything. She said she'd dealt with the government before and it didn't turn out like she planned. Obviously she has some deep-seeded distrust of it now but what could a ride home hurt?

We follow him down to the long black limousine parked on the curb. Everyone piles in, first Mom, then Slade, then me, and then Tess, still distrustful of Slade and not taking any chances, small as they may be.

The limo is lined like a booth with two benches lined on either side. Slade swings himself over to the other side, leaving Mom, Tess, and I scrunched together. The ride is completely silent, broken only by Mom occasionally shouting out directions. She leads him in the area of our apartment but not exactly to the position, obviously sensing Tess' hesitancy toward Slade.

I didn't mind too much especially since I was pretty sure we were walking home from the apartment building all the way over in Suicide Slums. We hop out of the limo with a thank you, or in Tess' case a cold nod in his general direction.

People are now beginning to clear out of their most likely small apartments, grumpy, and now high on caffeine for early meetings. Mom is usually among them, just like today, except today for an entirely different reason. We probably look like garbage among the flow of neatly-pressed suits. Mom just doesn't seem to care and is making no effort at all to appear put-together, Tess, however, is attracting many different stares, ranging from admiration to what is her deal?.

I personally don't particularly enjoy enjoy being the center of attention, Mom's the same way. We both prefer to do things behind the scenes, but Tess just has the commanding presence that demands the attention that I prefer to shy away from. It just makes it that much harder to keep the secrets that I have to keep. Then I remember that she might be able to hear me.

Not that a commanding presence is a bad thing. It can be a very good thing. I look over at Tess to see if there is some form of a reaction. There is none. Now I kind of feel like a fool.

Wait! She's suspicious of Slade. She has telepathy. She has to have a reason. She must have heard something. "Did you hear something?"

Her head slowly turns toward me in question. "You know," I say, tapping my head.

"It's an alien ship. The guards caught a brief glimpse of alien. It looked like a girl, right around your age. She had long, vivid red hair. That'd all I could gather besides the fact that Slade was fairly angered by the lack of information."

We get to the apartment only to find that the elevator's down, yet again. But the promise of my bed is enough to get me through. Tess scowls at the elevator as though that would magically make it better. Unfortunately, she's no Zatanna so the the stairs were still calling.

We climb the stairs slowly. I push the through the metallic swinging door. I go up to the door and dig my keys out of my pocket. I shove it through the lock and find myself walking to my bed. I faintly hear Mom telling Tess she can take the couch before going to bed herself. I don't bother with my shoes and just plop down on the bed face first, falling asleep on impact.

I'm interrupted a few hours later by a knocking on the door. As I previously mentioned, Mom is the heaviest sleeper known to man, therefore she will not be getting up to get it. I come out of my room and walk to the door before realizing that Tess is crashed on the couch. "Chloe? Mike?," Uncle Clark's voice rings through the apartment. I whip my head back around to Tess, who is out cold.

"Hold on," I call out. I dash over to Tess and hesitate before shaking her awake.

"Wake up," I whisper hoarsely.

Tess slowly sits up. She narrows her eyes in disgust. "What?" she questions furiously in a dangerously normal tone.

"Who else is in there, Mike?" Uncle Clark asks again.

Tess shoots up and looks around the room, probably for a hiding place. "No one." There's no way he'll believe it. He never looks in my room so I dash over and hold the door open. Tess rushes through.

At the same hurried speed I move back to the door and pull it open. "You know how good my hearing is, right, Mike?" I nod, hoping his amazing hearing won't pick up my thudding heart. I glance at the clock, 11:30.

"I definitely heard a girl's voice. Do you have a girlfriend over or something that you're afraid to tell me about?" My face unconsciously scrunches up in disgust. Ew, Tess? That's weird, that's really weird.

"No," I answer.

Mom comes through looking completely refreshed, a lot different than I probably look. "Mike, it's okay," he says moving toward my room.

I shove myself between him and the door. "What're you doing?"

Mom raises an eyebrow from behind Uncle Clark. He turns to Mom for an explanation. I desperately mouth "Tess".

"Uhhhh," she starts, not understanding what I'm trying to say. I have to learn to mouth better. Or she has to learn to understand better. Either way we need silent communication lessons. I try again. Nothing. Ugh, this isn't going well.

"Okay," Uncle Clark says, "something's up." He pushes the door open and...Tess is nowhere to be found. Did she jump out the window or something? Where'd she go? He looks around the room squinting so I know he's using his x-ray vision. Please let Tess be as good as she's cracked up to be. Uncle Clark moves toward my closet and pulls it open. There stands Tess.

"Tess?"

I sigh. "The closet, really?" Mom asks


	15. Chapter 15

A/N: I know it took me forever to post this. But I have been so busy it's not even funny. That and I just was having to force myself to write, which is never good because I end up going back and fixing the same thing fifteen times. I was saved only by the awesomeness that is Chloe and Tess. Hopefully the next chapter won't take so long. If you bother to read this please review, it always gets the ball rolling in my head.

"Because jumping out the window is a brilliant idea," she replies pointedly at Mom.

She turns her attention to Uncle Clark and answers, "Hello, Clark," before pushing past into the much more open room.

He opens his mouth to say something but Tess holds up her pointer finger to silence him. "I understand you have a lot of questions, but know I can't answer any of them."

"Why?"

Tess looks at him dumbfounded that he just said that. "I think that qualifies as any doesn't it?"

"Yeah, but Tess what happened? Why didn't you come back? Who else knows? Tess, why didn't you trust us?" He finishes.

"Clark she wasn't in this alone. I've been helping her for a year and a half."

He looked hurt, like he was upset he wasn't trusted. "Why didn't you tell us that you were okay though? Tess I went to your funeral, I mourned you. Did you ever think about the pain it caused?"

"I did. And I came to the conclusion that if you knew it would hurt you more, physically," she added with emphasis, "Clark, we were dealing with people who were in all likelihood working with meteor rock. They could hurt you."

"Then why not tell Oliver?"

Mom stepped in, now making herself an official part of this. "If we had told Oliver you would have just been mad that you and Lois were the only ones out of loop. Frankly, you've been dealing with trust issues since I met you, and that hasn't changed, but there comes a time when you just have to step back. I know you feel like you have a lot of responsibility with your powers that put the weight of the by world on your shoulders. But you have to learn that we are perfectly capable of taking care of ourselves!"

"That still doesn't answer my question."

"It shouldn't have to!" Mom yells.

Tess, from what I've seen, is generally the level head. She decides not to let them wake the  
entire city. "Clark, she's trying to make you see that we can take care of ourselves. I've been taking care of myself long before and after I met you."

Ouch, the guilt card. I don't even know what happened but it hurt. "If you need help you know where to find me," he said as he sped away.

"I do hate doing that to him but I had to. He wouldn't have left if I didn't," Tess said, attempting to console herself more than anything.

Mom breaks the silence after a moment. "Well, we might as well get going. We're all awake anyway." She gives a half-hearted smile before going to get changed.

Tess is still standing there, arms crossed, looking very conflicted. I'd really like to help her but I've always been bad at comforting people. I stutter, "uh, Tess."

She looks back up to me. "Yes."

"Could you, uh..."

She doesn't understand. "Um, I gotta, um, you know..."

"What, Mike?"

I motion to my body. "I gotta get changed."

"Why didn't you say so?" said, leaving the room. I get changed into basically the same outfit, jeans, and a blue t-shirt. I walk out to see Tess lounging on the couch, looking completely comfortable. "You make it seem like this isn't the first time you've been here."

"It isn't." She stops at that, leaving me feeling very creeped out. She was in my house while I was sleeping. She's creepy.

Mom steps out of her bedroom, in a similar outfit to yesterday. V-neck t-shirt in some kind of light blue that I can't identify, a matching patterned scarf, jeans, and brown boots. That was probably the most detailed description I've ever given of an outfit. Tess, however is in the same outfit; brown jacket, white t-shirt, a little stained, jeans, and combat boots. I wonder when the last time she changed was. She was clean yesterday, but I can only imagine. I'm suddenly very glad I'm not OCD.

We walk out the door to a gorgeous sight, the elevator is fixed! Tess breathes a sigh of relief. "Aw, come on, Tess, do stairs really scare you that much?" Mom jibes.

"You can take the stairs, Mike and I can take the elevator," she returns.

"Fair enough." Tess gives an 'exactly' nod that makes me laugh. We all pile into the elevator and it starts with one of those sickening lurches that they always start with. The ride is silent, but with a lighter air than the previous silence. We walk through the lobby, with me just far enough behind them to see the similar pep in both Mom and Tess' step, regardless of the obvious height difference.

A hand from each of them extends out to push the door open. Mom's light blue Volkswagen bug is parked directly in front of the building. Mom goes around to the driver's seat and Tess seats herself in the passenger seat, leaving me with the back. I slide myself over to the middle seat so that I am not completely out of the conversation.

The drive is also silent and I begins to wonder whether they were like this the two years I wasn't aware of Tess' existence or if they're this quiet because of my presence. "What are you guys thinking? On the alien?" I ask, hoping to spark some kind of conversation.

"My initial thought was to consult the fortress. But then I realized that Clark would demand information as to why, and we just can't give him that quite yet."

"Right. But even you have to realize that at some point we are going to have to fill them in on what we're dealing with."

"Didn't you mention something about a new hero with connections to people that have much more knowledge on the universe than we do?" I recall.

"Hal!" Mom slaps her forehead with one hand keeping the other on the steering wheel. Tess looks at Mom questioningly, encouraging her to explain what she's talking about. "Hal Jordan, he's part of what is called the Green Lantern Corps. It's run by these little blue old men who have been around forever. They apparently know about all the hoopla that goes on around everywhere. Hal's a new recruit. He's nice, probably perfectly willing to help."

"Detour?" I suggest.

"He's a resource from for later, but we don't want to involve anyone more than we have to."

"Much less some intergalactic police force, I get it. I'm just saying that we should keep him in mind for later."

"Understood."

By this point we've arrived to a field in the middle of nowhere, aka Smallville. "The directions say this is the place."

"They lied," I reply.

"I'm not so sure," Tess says opening the door and walking out to the field. Mysteriously, she squatted down and picked up a handful of dirt. Mom looks back at with a question on her face that perfectly mirrors mine. Tess throws the dirt forward where it's blocked by something, and slides down back to the ground. I can tell she's smiling even though I can't see it. Mom gets out of the car and I follow her lead.

She goes to Tess' side and I stand just back a little. "We passed your test, Slade. Let us in."

Seemingly, put of nowhere a door opens. "I wanted to see just how well aquatinted you are with weird."

"Very," Mom answers. He turns to the side, allowing us passage. Our group moves forward into a huge brick room with cubicles making rows in thine center of the room. Individual computers are set up in each cubicle, but a bigger one wraps itself around the whole room calling to us three hackers. Tess seems as though she's mildly surprised, pleasantly. Mom's eyes light up and I'd imagine mine do something similar.

A guy with glasses comes over and hands Slade a file, but not before throwing a suspicious look Tess' way. Tess chuckles. "Already made a name for yourself, huh?" I joke.

"Her reputation seems to have preceded her," Mom agrees.

Tess shrugs nonchalantly in reply. Slade hands Mom the file and says, "I'm not going to micromanage you but I do expect you to check in, and take backup when necessary."

Tess opens her mouth to object but is thwarted by Mom who agrees to the terms and conditions.

"What's in the file?"

"Just some pictures that are in desperate need of a touch up, or a new photographer," she adds.

"Well, why don't we see if we can fix that?" Tess replies as she stalks over to one of the computer that's connected to another machine off to the side of it. She begins to type as Mom heads over to the other machine. The picture appears as a hologram above the machine mom's working with. She minimizes it and drags it to the corner. "You're connecting to the other cameras."

"Right. Using the the holograph you can create-"

"A 3D model."

"Exactly."

Different pictures begin to pop up and Mom fits them together like a puzzle. "Can you..." Mom begins.

"Yeah if you..." Tess also starts, neither bothering to finish their sentences before switching places. Tess slides up a graph which will be used to create the model as Mom continues to bring up and clean up each of the pictures.

"Chloe," Tess says, enlarging one and pointing to her bright neon green eyes that glowed spectacularly, "Mistake or a clue?"

She looks over and raises an eyebrow. "You know Hal May have had better timing than we thought."


	16. Chapter 16

Mom comes running up to the car that Tess, Hal, Starfire, that's what the girl told us her name was, and I occupied. "Okay, they're about as happy as Lois on a Monday without coffee when Cat takes the last maple donut."

Tess closes her eyes frustration. "Clark'll live," she says as she puts the car in drive.

I scrunch up my eyebrows in confusion and look to Hal, who shrugs. "And who is Clark, if I may?" Starfire asks.

"My uncle," I answer.

She nods. "Is he in danger?"

"Not as far as I know."

"Than why-"

"I don't know," I cut her off. Tess drives up to the cops that blocked the entrance.

"Excuse me, ma'am, but you cannot take-"

"Wanna bet?" Mom challenges. His face slackens and he tells his buddies to get out of the way. Tess smirks.

After a moment Starfire has another question. "Is it customary for humans to sit this close while traveling?"

Mom and Hal look at me smiling. "Not really," I answer warily.

"Than does this mean you prefer to be close to me?"

My face goes bright red. Mom and Hal are struggling not to laugh. And even Tess is definitely finding this funny, judging by the broad and devious smile that spread across her face. "Um, I, um, no, I mean" I stutter.

"I'm sorry. I did not mean to make you feel uncomfortable."

"No, i just. I wasn't ready for that," I explain.

After another few moments Hal decides to spark another conversation. "So,Starfire, what's your story."

"I am the princess of Tameran. I was sent to Earth to assist the one known as Kal-El. Do you know him? He is supposed to be a hero to your people."

"He stops seeming heroic after three broken coffee machines," Tess quips. Mom makes an I understand that face. Hal chuckles. But Starfire is confused.

"Than he is no longer a hero?"

"He is," Hal explains.

"Technically," Mom adjusts. Starfire nods in understanding.

"Can you take me to him?"

"That's where we're heading," Tess explains as we turn into Metropolis.

We turn down onto the street Watchtower is on she asks another question. "Is this where he is?"

"Usually," Mom says as she hops out of the car. Tess turns it off and gets out as well. Hal slides out one side and Starfire fiddles with the door until Hal opens it for her. I notice Mom admiring the gentlemanly act as she bites down on her lip. Tess and my eyes meet and she nods, indicating she saw the sparks between Mom and Hal, too.

We go up to the floor where Watchtower is actually Watchtower. Mom puts in the security codes and scans her hand, opening the elevator. We pile in and Starfire stares in wonder at the technology located throughout even the elevator.

The doors slide open and Hal, Mom, Tess, and I go and sit on the plush couches. Starfire hesitates but I wave her over and she sits down next to me with posture stiffer than I had ever seen. I wanted to help he relax but I just didn't know how. So she sat there with perfect posture even though Hal's head was laying in Mom's lap, Tess was already hunched over a laptop, and I lounged myself the corner.

The doors slide open and Starfire, literally, flies up to meet the person. "Kal-El!" she cries. Only problem is, it's not 'Kal-El', it's Uncle Oliver. She wraps her arms around him and Uncle Oliver just stands there holding her not entirely sure what to do. He keeps looking down at her and to me. I shrug. Mom and Hal are cracking up again and Tess is smirking.

But he doesn't see her. His attention is entirely fixated on this strange girl in his arms. Tess stands up, still smirking, "Come on Oliver, I thought you would be better with girls."

His jaw drops. His whole body slackens. Starfire lets go of him and looks at him, questioningly. "Is something wrong?" she says looking from him to me. Hal and Mom's laughter has subsided to the broad smile that generally follows such laughter. But is quickly replaced by a serious look after seeing Uncle Oliver's face.

Tess' face hasn't changed, which shocks me. Oliver's face contorts into a cocky borderline arrogant grin that I'd only seen hints of. "Well, I always made you think I deserved it."

"Oh, I always thought you deserved something, but credit wasn't it." A side of Tess I hadn't expected came out as well. She's playful. There is banter, it is odd. Starfire seems to be thinking the same thing as she looked between one and the other.

"No it certainly wasn't," he flirts. Hal and Mom exchange a knowing look. Starfire ruined the moment. "Kal-El I'm confused."

"So am I, but you learn not to ask questions," he replies, "I'm not Kal-El."

From down the hall Aunt Lois' voice sounds, "I don't know about you but after you pick up whatever Chloe told you to I am ready for a movie night complete with rocky road ice cream!" She walks in and sees Tess, her eyes pop wide open.

She turns to Mom. "I hope you weren't planning on having us bring that home," she says, indicating Tess. Tess cracks a smile.

"Believe me the last place I want to be is with that dog of yours," Tess assures. There's a connection that seems to have been missing all these years, as though everyone's refreshed and the missing puzzle piece has been found. Everyone's mood seemed lighter.

"Is this Kal-El?" Starfire asks me. I nod.

"Kal-El!" She runs over and embraces the right person this time.

Aunt Lois scrunches up her face. "Jealous, Lo?" Mom jabs.

"You know, those fifteen year old girls always endanger relationships," Uncle Oliver jokes.

"And those numbers keep climbing," Hal joins in.

Aunt Lois sticks her tongue out at them. And everyone laughs. Uncle Clark and Starfire go in private to talk. Someone ends up suggesting a movie and everyone else agrees.

There was definitely something missing. I guess even though it didn't seem like it Tess was important to the group. Tess affected Uncle Oliver, and he affected Aunt Lois and Uncle Clark. It all made sense, after a bit of thought.

A/N: Really glad I finally finished that. I really felt like it was dragging on for too long. I know it's not a fantastic ending (I'm not really good at them in general) but I'm pretty sure no one was really reading this too avidly anyway or else I would have tried to give it a better ending, but it was all I could really come up with at the moment. So anyway, if you did read this thanks for reading! Those who did review it meant a lot to me and got me through some of he tougher chapters, besides completely making my day. I know it's the last chapter but still review on it. Like I said makes my day and encourages me to write more! Thank you!


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